I remember the hullabaloo about the Femke Van den Driessche case; I'm shocked that the IEEE article's contention that the motor used there could produce 200W of

I remember the hullabaloo about the Femke Van den Driessche case; I'm shocked that the IEEE article's contention that the motor used there could produce 200W of power. 200W is a LOT in cycling. See https://www.cyclinganalytics.com/blog/2018/06/how-does-your-cycling-power-output-compare https://www.cyclinganalytics.com/blog/2018/06/how-does-your-... We talk about one's Functional Threshold Power, which is the amount of power you could produce for a solid hour and then be completely spent. There are a variety of ways to arrive at this number (ie, other than trying to do exactly that, which is fraught with peril b/c of pacing issues), but the metric is well respected and is used as the foundation of most cycling training plans. So the wattage is one thing, but your weight is the other. Watts per kilo is the magic number, because obviously it takes more power to move 6'3" Wout Van Aert than it does to move 5'9" Tadej Pogacar. Big men make more power, but it takes more power to move them, so usually the winners look more like Pogi (or, in the case of this year's Tour de France, they look EXACTLY like Pogi, ha ha). Anyway: 200W is a BIG number. A LOT has been made of Pogacar's performance this year, and it may be his output was the highest ever seen in the sport. Estimates places his FTP in the 7w/kg range, which is bananas. Pogi weighs 66kg, that implies power of about 462W. He may well be the most elite, powerful guy to ever race, and a 200W motor would add 40% for HIM. Van den Driessche is not in his league; it's likely 200W would come close to doubling her FTP. If you're going to cheat, you need to be subtle. 200W isn't subtle. 200W output also implies one HECK of a battery, which would be obvious when lifting the bike. Given that the bike in question was for cyclocross -- where competitors carry their bikes often as they cross obstacles -- I'm thinking that must be a mistake. The article ALSO note that while the maker of the motor in question is out of business, you can also experience a 200W push with a bike from Lotus. However, if you click through, you find that Lotus is claiming the motor in the bike they're selling "weighs just 300 grams but packs a powerful 125W per kilogram." IOW, the assist motor puts out only 37W.